Race Review - Knockburn Standard Triathlon

So let me start this week with the numbers. Because this race is very much a case of being lies, damned lies and race times.

Full results are here.

Targets
Swim < 27 mins
Bike < 1 hr 20 mins
Run < 50 mins
Total < 2 hrs 45 mins

Actuals 
Swim 25:26
Bike 1:22:06
Run 46:24
Total 2:36:30

From those it looks like I had a pretty great day. The one red, while 2 minutes outside my target time is still within 4 seconds of my best ever bike time for the same course.

So why am I going to write off a 9-minute personal best as a bad day out? 

I still felt very empty in the morning. Either two days is not enough recovery time or I have a bug of some sort. I am still keen to blame the 'over-training' as the only other explanations for being so run down for the past few weeks would be long-term illness problems. Over-training does seem like a cop out though. I trained much harder when I was a track athlete, and while I am doing more time and distance than ever before, the lack of a job to fill 50 hours of my week means I am doing a lot more rest and recovery as well. 

Anyway, on to the actual race. 

I got to the venue in plenty of time and got my transition set up and sat down to listen to the briefing. I had to pay special attention to the run briefing, as even with the map I was still struggling to understand sections of the new run route. It did all seem to be taped up and marshalled well enough that I wouldn't get lost though, so I was pretty relaxed as I got into my wet suit and made my way down to the water. 

I waded in to knee depth and then waded straight back out again. The water was really cold and there was nothing to be gained from getting in 10 minutes early and getting cold. I lurked around on the bank until it looked like most people were in the water and then I got in and paddled up to the start line. Even with this I was still shivering from the cold by the time the starter was ready to go. 

I picked a spot in the second row, over to the left, which is the faster racing line round the anti-clockwise loop. The briefing had said to only take this line if you were a confident open-water swimmer and I was pretty sure I fit in that bracket. As we started I got off and into the washing machine fairly well and took a good line to the first buoy. Because I mainly only breathe to the right it meant I had a good view of the rest of the field with every breath and some of them were taking a massively wide line as they hugged the shoreline. 

I took a big punch to the face as we went in to the first buoy. Fortunately he caught me on the goggles and pushed them into my eye, which gave them that uncomfortable sucking effect on my eye but didn't actually affect my swim. For most of the first lap the swim was fairly choppy. I felt like I was really struggling and as we turned the buoy at the bottom of the lap I got into a small group and decided just to try and cruise along and draft as much as I could as I felt awful. 

Into the second lap and I realised that the few guys in the group were all going to take the massively wide line again so I ignored them and took the faster line. As soon as I left them and was in clear water it felt like someone had flipped a switch and I relaxed into my swim. Within half a dozen strokes I had gapped the group and was moving easily away from them in the calmer water. I kept this up all the way to and round the island and then started looking for swimmers ahead to chase. The gap from me to the next swimmer was massive, at least 30 meters, and I suddenly felt disheartened again. I felt that I must have been going really slow on the first lap and be back with the stragglers group if I can get away from them so easily but not be in the main field. I coasted on round the bottom of the loch and out of the water, checking my watch and expecting to see a time around 30 minutes. 25:15 as I clambered out of the water? That can't be right, either the swim is way short or something is wrong with the watch. I am nearly 2 minutes up on my plan despite feeling awful. 

In hindsight I think the split head creating a smaller field this year made the gaps between groups bigger and more obvious than previous years. Garmin says the swim was about the right distance but the GPS signal is patchy so it could still be very short. Either that or I swam at my 400m pace for 1,500m.

Never mind, I still feel rubbish as I come out of the swim so I am just going to tap round the bike and run for the rest of the day as a training session. 

Into T1 and I had a bit of a disaster. I got the top half of my suit off easily enough and sat down to take the legs off. And my arms were just too tired. No strength in my fingers and the suit wouldn't go over my right foot. OK, be calm, do the left foot first, no that one is stuck at my knee because the top half of the suit has rolled inside. Back to the right foot, push, kick, wriggle, try sticking a hand inside it, ok. One foot out and then I have to try and unroll the suit to get it off my other leg. Stand up, helmet on, glasses on. Why am I standing up without my shoes on? Sit down again, bike shoes on. Unrack bike, head for the exit to be stopped by the marshall to check my bike number, which I have put on the other side of the bike (as instructed!) so I have to wait as he has to come all the way round the bike to check it. And then out of T1 and mount up. 2 minutes in T1, terrible, but I budgeted 3 minutes for transitions and my T2 is good this year so I am still the best part of 2 minutes ahead of my plan. And anyway, I am just training round, not racing any more. 

So I try and get comfortable on the bike, only I can't. I feel empty and my back and neck hurt already. The first mile and a half is downhill and I can normally go full gas and fly down it. Today I am nervy and not adding any speed on the descent. Even sitting up for a couple of corners that I know I can take flat out. At least this first 5 minutes is giving me a chance to settle my breathing and get into a rhythm. 

I have to slow into the turn for the first lap as a car is coming. That scrubs off what speed I had from the descent and gives someone from behind a better approach to the corner and he shoots past. He doesn't make any move to get away though so I try and sit back outside his draft box and work just enough to stay there. As we go through what should be the fast leg of the triangle a couple of other riders come past, including one I recognise as someone I want to be competitive against, but who started in Heat 2. So he has already made up 5 minutes on me (actually only 4 minutes as Heat 1 started a minute late). The pair of them go past trying to overtake each other and behaving very well, both trying to stay outside of drafting each other by riding at an offset as they pass each other on opposing climbs and flat sections. The guy just in front of me behaves less well and uses them both to draft and this pulls him away from me. 

As we go through a set of sweeping bends two cars pass us. The second is a turquoise Ford Focus. The driver is a complete idiot and comes within inches of taking out the three guys in front. The one I want to be racing gives him a wave but the Focus keeps on driving as if nothing was wrong. 

If you drive a turquoise Ford Focus and were out by the Feughside Inn at about 10:35 on Sunday morning, you should hand your driving licence back before you kill someone.

For the next half of the lap I watch the three of them, two working fairly and one drafting them ridiculously as they gradually pull away. A couple of other Vets from the slower heat pass me and start to stretch away as well. As we turn on to what should be the faster section I am happy to find that the dressed surface is rough, but not loose. So it will be slower but not as dangerous as I feared. 

Through that section and onto lap 2 on the bike and I think I have been passed by 3 Super-Vets, but still no ladies, and only the one guy from my heat who took me at the first turn and then drafted away. About two-thirds of the way round the second lap the first lady passes me on a short climb, closely followed by the second lady. Then as we turn onto the fast, badly surfaced section they get away from me with some very dodgy cornering using the whole road but then they don't get out of sight for almost a lap. A couple more Super-Vets that I recognise also pass me on lap 3 but there really doesn't seem to be much movement in positions. 

As I came round lap 3 I started trying to do some maths in my head and realised that even though I feel terrible my bike time isn't actually bad. With the climb back up to the loch still to come I am not going to beat my 1:20 target but I am going to be close to last year's time of 1:22. I still don't understand how I did this time while feeling terrible the whole way. I had a gel just before coming into sight of the loch again. 

Again I am going to put this down to the smaller field and bigger spaces rather than anything else. 

I didn't catch a single person on the bike. My time on the bike is almost exactly the same as last year. I can play the tired legs, road surface and the wind conditions against what should be much better bike fitness. This makes the time fair enough. 

I coasted into T2 out of my shoes, rolled up to the line, got both feet down at a run and straight into my spot, hung the bike, helmet off, run shoes on, and out of T2. End to end in 26 seconds. Only 2 of the 85 competitors manage to sneak under that with a 23 and 24. I am pretty pleased with that.

And out on to the run. I took a look at my watch as I turned on to the main course and it said 1:50. So I have only to clock a 55 minute 10k to make my overall race target. 9 minute miles will just about do that, 8 minute miles will also get me close to the 50 minute run target as well. 

The new run course is definitely different to the old version. The general consensus is that it is 'flatter'. Strava certainly supports that view with 147ft of climb versus 428ft on the old course. This doesn't account for how I managed to go 4 minutes faster whilst feeling terrible and running badly. What does account for a chunk of the difference is that the new course is over quarter of a mile shorter than the old course.

The twisty new course means that you see a lot of the other racers but it is difficult to tell which lap they are on and how fast they are going. I got into a bit of a head-to-head race with one guy who caught up to me but then on the second lap I had a bit of a second wind and managed to stretch away from him in the last mile. 

I should be happy with the times, especially the swim time which is a clear minute under my target for the year. I still think the swim was short, and the garmin track for the swim is so patchy that it is hard to be sure how far it actually was. To do a 25 min 1,500m I would have to do two 750m PBs back-to-back and I know I was nowhere near that pace. Similarly the run course was so much shorter and flatter that it is incomparable to previous years and makes the target times meaningless. 

So I felt terrible the whole race, and I really didn't enjoy any of it. I don't think the faster times are genuine. Comparing to last year I am 9 minutes faster but a lot of other people are 6-8 minutes faster than their 2014 times so I think the course was mostly responsible for the time.